"Given what we've already done, there's truly no limit to what we can achieve together," said Carter, in an excerpt of his speech provided to reporters. "That's why I've been pushing the Pentagon to think outside our five-sided box, and invest in innovation here in Silicon Valley and in tech communities across the country. And now we're taking another step forward."
During his first trip in April, Carter launched a new program called Defense Innovation Unit-Experimental aimed at scouting out promising emerging technologies and beefing up the Pentagon's ability to work with high-tech firms. On Friday he will visit the unit's new office.
One of Carter's much-repeated goals is to build better relations with high-tech industry in order to better equip the military force of the future.
According to a senior defense official, using such partnerships allows the department to pursue technologies it might not otherwise be able to invest in. And officials are making a strategic bet that the innovations that spring from the projects would also have commercial uses. The official was not authorized to discuss the issue prior to public release, and so spoke on condition of anonymity.
"For those interested in foreign policy and national security, there are lots of interesting challenges and problems to work on," said Carter in another speech excerpt. "And that's also true for those interested in technology. But the intersection of the two is an opportunity-rich environment."
According to the Pentagon, flexible hybrid electronics manufacturing is an innovative process at the intersection of the electronics industry and the high-precision printing industry. It can create light-weight sensors that can conform to the curves of the human body or stretch across the structure of an object.
The winning consortium includes major companies like Apple, United Technologies and Hewlett Packard with others that can embed these flexible, bendable electronics into everything from medical devices to supersonic jets.
This project is the seventh such private-public partnership to be announced by the Obama administration. Six are led by the Defense Department, and this one will be managed by the Air Force Research Laboratory.
Earlier this month Vice President Joe Biden unveiled one focused on photonics research in Rochester, N.Y., while others included a 3-D printing technology hub in Youngstown, Ohio, and an advanced materials center in Knoxville, Tennessee, Biden's office said.
